Over the past decade, the controversial issue of gay marriage has emerged as a primary battle in the culture wars and a definitive social issue of our time. The subject moved to the forefront of ...
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Over the past decade, the controversial issue of gay marriage has emerged as a primary battle in the culture wars and a definitive social issue of our time. The subject moved to the forefront of mainstream public debate in 2004, when San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom began authorizing same-sex marriage licenses, and it has remained in the forefront through three presidential campaigns and numerous state ballot initiatives. This book examines how prominent news outlets presented this issue from 2003 to 2012, a time when intense news coverage focused unprecedented attention on gay and lesbian life. During this time, gay rights leaders sought to harness the power of news media to advocate for marriage equality and to reform their community's public image. Building on in-depth interviews with gay rights activists and a comprehensive, longitudinal study of news stories, this book investigates these leaders' aims and how their frames, tactics, and messages evolved over time. In the end, media coverage of the gay marriage debate both aided and undermined the cause. Media exposure gave activists a platform to discuss gay and lesbian families. But it also triggered an upsurge in opposing responses and pressured activists to depict gay life in a way calculated to appeal to heterosexual audiences. Ultimately, this book reveals both the promises and the limitations of commercial media as a route to social change.Less

The Battle over Marriage : Gay Rights Activism through the Media

Leigh Moscowitz

Published in print: 2013-11-01

Over the past decade, the controversial issue of gay marriage has emerged as a primary battle in the culture wars and a definitive social issue of our time. The subject moved to the forefront of mainstream public debate in 2004, when San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom began authorizing same-sex marriage licenses, and it has remained in the forefront through three presidential campaigns and numerous state ballot initiatives. This book examines how prominent news outlets presented this issue from 2003 to 2012, a time when intense news coverage focused unprecedented attention on gay and lesbian life. During this time, gay rights leaders sought to harness the power of news media to advocate for marriage equality and to reform their community's public image. Building on in-depth interviews with gay rights activists and a comprehensive, longitudinal study of news stories, this book investigates these leaders' aims and how their frames, tactics, and messages evolved over time. In the end, media coverage of the gay marriage debate both aided and undermined the cause. Media exposure gave activists a platform to discuss gay and lesbian families. But it also triggered an upsurge in opposing responses and pressured activists to depict gay life in a way calculated to appeal to heterosexual audiences. Ultimately, this book reveals both the promises and the limitations of commercial media as a route to social change.

Chinese-speaking popular cultures have never been so queer as in this digital, globalist age. In response to the proliferation of queer representations, productions, fantasies, and desires, ...
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Chinese-speaking popular cultures have never been so queer as in this digital, globalist age. In response to the proliferation of queer representations, productions, fantasies, and desires, especially as manifested online, this book explores extended, diversified, and transculturally informed fan communities and practices based in mainland China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan that have cultivated various forms of queerness. To right an imbalance in the scholarly literature on queer East Asia, this volume is weighted toward an exploration of queer elements of mainland Chinese fandoms that have been less often written about than more visible cultural elements in Hong Kong and Taiwan. Case studies drawn from mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and the flows among them include: the Chinese online Hetalia fandom; Chinese fans’ queer gossip on the American L-Word actress Katherine Moennig; Dongfang Bubai iterations; the HOCC fandom; cross-border fans of Li Yuchun; and Japaneseness in Taiwanese BL fantasies; among others.Less

Published in print: 2017-07-10

Chinese-speaking popular cultures have never been so queer as in this digital, globalist age. In response to the proliferation of queer representations, productions, fantasies, and desires, especially as manifested online, this book explores extended, diversified, and transculturally informed fan communities and practices based in mainland China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan that have cultivated various forms of queerness. To right an imbalance in the scholarly literature on queer East Asia, this volume is weighted toward an exploration of queer elements of mainland Chinese fandoms that have been less often written about than more visible cultural elements in Hong Kong and Taiwan. Case studies drawn from mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and the flows among them include: the Chinese online Hetalia fandom; Chinese fans’ queer gossip on the American L-Word actress Katherine Moennig; Dongfang Bubai iterations; the HOCC fandom; cross-border fans of Li Yuchun; and Japaneseness in Taiwanese BL fantasies; among others.

A transnational study of Asian performance shaped by the homoerotics of orientalism, this book focuses on the relationship between the white man and the native boy. It unpacks this as the central ...
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A transnational study of Asian performance shaped by the homoerotics of orientalism, this book focuses on the relationship between the white man and the native boy. It unpacks this as the central trope for understanding colonial and cultural encounters in twentieth- and twenty-first-century Asia and its diaspora. Using the native boy as a critical guide, the book formulates alternative readings of a traditional Balinese ritual, postcolonial Anglophone theatre in Singapore, and performance art in Asian America. Tracing the transnational formation of the native boy as racial fetish object across the last century, the book follows this figure as he is passed from the hands of the colonial empire to the postcolonial nation-state to neoliberal globalization. Read through such figurations, the traffic in native boys among white men serves as an allegory of an infantilized and emasculated Asia, subordinate before colonial whiteness and modernity. Pushing further, the book addresses the critical paradox of this entrenched relationship that resides even within queer theory itself by formulating critical interventions around “Asian performance”.Less

Brown Boys and Rice Queens : Spellbinding Performance in the Asias

Eng-Beng Lim

Published in print: 2013-11-22

A transnational study of Asian performance shaped by the homoerotics of orientalism, this book focuses on the relationship between the white man and the native boy. It unpacks this as the central trope for understanding colonial and cultural encounters in twentieth- and twenty-first-century Asia and its diaspora. Using the native boy as a critical guide, the book formulates alternative readings of a traditional Balinese ritual, postcolonial Anglophone theatre in Singapore, and performance art in Asian America. Tracing the transnational formation of the native boy as racial fetish object across the last century, the book follows this figure as he is passed from the hands of the colonial empire to the postcolonial nation-state to neoliberal globalization. Read through such figurations, the traffic in native boys among white men serves as an allegory of an infantilized and emasculated Asia, subordinate before colonial whiteness and modernity. Pushing further, the book addresses the critical paradox of this entrenched relationship that resides even within queer theory itself by formulating critical interventions around “Asian performance”.

In late nineteenth-century England, “mannish” women were considered socially deviant but not homosexual. A half-century later, such masculinity equaled lesbianism in the public imagination. How did ...
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In late nineteenth-century England, “mannish” women were considered socially deviant but not homosexual. A half-century later, such masculinity equaled lesbianism in the public imagination. How did this shift occur? This book illustrates that the equation of female masculinity with female homosexuality is a relatively recent phenomenon, a result of changes in national and racial as well as sexual discourses in early twentieth-century public culture. Incorporating cultural histories of prewar women’s suffrage debates, British sexology, women’s work on the home front during World War I, and discussions of interwar literary representations of female homosexuality, the text maps the emergence of lesbian representations in relation to the decline of empire and the rise of eugenics in England. It integrates discussions of the histories of male and female same-sex erotics in readings of New Woman, representations of male and female suffragists, wartime trials of pacifist novelists and seditious artists, and the interwar infamy of novels such as Radclyffe Hall’s The Well of Loneliness and Virginia Woolf’s Orlando.Less

Citizen, Invert, Queer : Lesbianism and War in Early Twentieth-Century Britain

Deborah Cohler

Published in print: 2010-08-30

In late nineteenth-century England, “mannish” women were considered socially deviant but not homosexual. A half-century later, such masculinity equaled lesbianism in the public imagination. How did this shift occur? This book illustrates that the equation of female masculinity with female homosexuality is a relatively recent phenomenon, a result of changes in national and racial as well as sexual discourses in early twentieth-century public culture. Incorporating cultural histories of prewar women’s suffrage debates, British sexology, women’s work on the home front during World War I, and discussions of interwar literary representations of female homosexuality, the text maps the emergence of lesbian representations in relation to the decline of empire and the rise of eugenics in England. It integrates discussions of the histories of male and female same-sex erotics in readings of New Woman, representations of male and female suffragists, wartime trials of pacifist novelists and seditious artists, and the interwar infamy of novels such as Radclyffe Hall’s The Well of Loneliness and Virginia Woolf’s Orlando.

Across the world, public opinion about homosexuality varies substantially. While residents in some nations have embraced gay rights as human rights, in other countries, very few people find ...
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Across the world, public opinion about homosexuality varies substantially. While residents in some nations have embraced gay rights as human rights, in other countries, very few people find homosexuality acceptable. Why are there such big differences in attitudes about homosexuality? Using survey data from almost ninety societies, this book shows that cross-national differences in how residents view homosexuality can largely be explained by three country characteristics: the strength of democratic institutions, the level of economic development, and the religious context. While these factors can explain a lot of the differences across the world, the way they shape attitudes within individual nations varies substantially. Each country has a different story to tell about how these forces affect public opinion. Country case studies, a content analysis of newspaper articles, and in-depth interviews are used to unpack the characteristics working within individual and key sets of nations. Attention is given not only to demographic and country characteristics that shape public opinion but also to the way these factors work within specific countries and combine with a nation’s unique history and social context to shape attitudes, laws, policies, and enforcement regarding homosexuality.Less

Cross-National Public Opinion about Homosexuality : Examining Attitudes across the Globe

Amy Adamczyk

Published in print: 2017-01-31

Across the world, public opinion about homosexuality varies substantially. While residents in some nations have embraced gay rights as human rights, in other countries, very few people find homosexuality acceptable. Why are there such big differences in attitudes about homosexuality? Using survey data from almost ninety societies, this book shows that cross-national differences in how residents view homosexuality can largely be explained by three country characteristics: the strength of democratic institutions, the level of economic development, and the religious context. While these factors can explain a lot of the differences across the world, the way they shape attitudes within individual nations varies substantially. Each country has a different story to tell about how these forces affect public opinion. Country case studies, a content analysis of newspaper articles, and in-depth interviews are used to unpack the characteristics working within individual and key sets of nations. Attention is given not only to demographic and country characteristics that shape public opinion but also to the way these factors work within specific countries and combine with a nation’s unique history and social context to shape attitudes, laws, policies, and enforcement regarding homosexuality.

In the past two decades the city of Madrid has been marked by pride, feminism, and globalization—but also by the vestiges of the machismo nurtured during the long years of the Franco dictatorship. ...
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In the past two decades the city of Madrid has been marked by pride, feminism, and globalization—but also by the vestiges of the machismo nurtured during the long years of the Franco dictatorship. This book examines how lesbian literary culture fares in this mix from the end of the countercultural movement la movida madrileña in 1988 until the gay marriage march in 2005. This book traverses the various literary spaces of the city associated with queer culture, in particular the gay barrio of Chueca, revealing how it is a product of interrelations—a site crisscrossed by a multiplicity of subjects who constitute it as a queer space through the negotiation of their sexual, racial, gender, and class identities. The book recognizes Chueca as a political space as well, a refuge from homophobia. It also shows how the spatial and literary practices of Chueca relate to economic issues. In examining how women’s sexual identities have become visible in and through the Chueca phenomenon, this work is a revealing example of transnational queer studies within the broader Western discussion on gender and sexuality.Less

Crossing through Chueca : Lesbian Literary Culture in Queer Madrid

Jill Robbins

Published in print: 2011-06-21

In the past two decades the city of Madrid has been marked by pride, feminism, and globalization—but also by the vestiges of the machismo nurtured during the long years of the Franco dictatorship. This book examines how lesbian literary culture fares in this mix from the end of the countercultural movement la movida madrileña in 1988 until the gay marriage march in 2005. This book traverses the various literary spaces of the city associated with queer culture, in particular the gay barrio of Chueca, revealing how it is a product of interrelations—a site crisscrossed by a multiplicity of subjects who constitute it as a queer space through the negotiation of their sexual, racial, gender, and class identities. The book recognizes Chueca as a political space as well, a refuge from homophobia. It also shows how the spatial and literary practices of Chueca relate to economic issues. In examining how women’s sexual identities have become visible in and through the Chueca phenomenon, this work is a revealing example of transnational queer studies within the broader Western discussion on gender and sexuality.

Discourses on LGBT asylum in the UK analyses fifteen years of debate, activism and media narrative and examines the way asylum is conceptualized at the crossroads of nationhood, post colonialism and ...
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Discourses on LGBT asylum in the UK analyses fifteen years of debate, activism and media narrative and examines the way asylum is conceptualized at the crossroads of nationhood, post colonialism and sexual citizenship, reshaping in the process forms of sexual belongings to the nation.
Asylum has become a foremost site for the formulation and critique of LGBT human rights. This book intervenes in the ongoing discussion of homonationalism, sheds new light on the limitations of queer liberalism as a political strategy, and questions the prevailing modes of solidarity with queer migrants in the UK.
This book employs the methods of Discourse Analysis to study a large corpus encompassing media narratives, policy documents, debates with activists and NGOs, and also counter discourses emerging from art practice. The study of these discourses illuminates the construction of the social problem of LGBT asylum. Doing so, it shows how our understanding of asylum is firmly rooted in the individual stories of migration that are circulated in the media. The book also critiques the exclusionary management of cases by the state, especially in the way the state manufactures the authenticity of queer refugees. Finally, it investigates the affective economy of asylum, assessing critically the role of sympathy and challenging the happy goals of queer liberalism.
This book will be essential for researchers and students specializing in refugee studies and queer studies.Less

Discourses on LGBT Asylum in the Uk : Constructing a Queer Haven

Thibaut Raboin

Published in print: 2017-01-13

Discourses on LGBT asylum in the UK analyses fifteen years of debate, activism and media narrative and examines the way asylum is conceptualized at the crossroads of nationhood, post colonialism and sexual citizenship, reshaping in the process forms of sexual belongings to the nation.
Asylum has become a foremost site for the formulation and critique of LGBT human rights. This book intervenes in the ongoing discussion of homonationalism, sheds new light on the limitations of queer liberalism as a political strategy, and questions the prevailing modes of solidarity with queer migrants in the UK.
This book employs the methods of Discourse Analysis to study a large corpus encompassing media narratives, policy documents, debates with activists and NGOs, and also counter discourses emerging from art practice. The study of these discourses illuminates the construction of the social problem of LGBT asylum. Doing so, it shows how our understanding of asylum is firmly rooted in the individual stories of migration that are circulated in the media. The book also critiques the exclusionary management of cases by the state, especially in the way the state manufactures the authenticity of queer refugees. Finally, it investigates the affective economy of asylum, assessing critically the role of sympathy and challenging the happy goals of queer liberalism.
This book will be essential for researchers and students specializing in refugee studies and queer studies.

EATING FIRE: MY LIFE AS A LESBIAN AVENGER is an activist’s memoir spanning two decades from the Culture Wars of the ‘90’s through today’s War on Terror. Engaging the reader with a picaresque activist ...
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EATING FIRE: MY LIFE AS A LESBIAN AVENGER is an activist’s memoir spanning two decades from the Culture Wars of the ‘90’s through today’s War on Terror. Engaging the reader with a picaresque activist adventure, Cogswell simultaneously explores questions of identity, resistance, and citizenship, evoking Richard Wright’s Black Boy as she attempts to insert lesbians into America’s ongoing narrative of liberty and justice for all.Less

Eating Fire : My Life as a Lesbian Avenger

Kelly Cogswell

Published in print: 2014-03-01

EATING FIRE: MY LIFE AS A LESBIAN AVENGER is an activist’s memoir spanning two decades from the Culture Wars of the ‘90’s through today’s War on Terror. Engaging the reader with a picaresque activist adventure, Cogswell simultaneously explores questions of identity, resistance, and citizenship, evoking Richard Wright’s Black Boy as she attempts to insert lesbians into America’s ongoing narrative of liberty and justice for all.

For too long, LGBTQ communities—including Minnesota’s—have been maligned, misrepresented, and often outright ignored. Myths regarding the queer experience have grown and become embedded in local and ...
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For too long, LGBTQ communities—including Minnesota’s—have been maligned, misrepresented, and often outright ignored. Myths regarding the queer experience have grown and become embedded in local and national consciousness. The absence of queer stories over time in local historical and popular writing only served to further this ignorance, but great strides have been made in recent decades to celebrate Minnesota’s vibrant queer history. This book presents a history of queer life in Minnesota. The text blends oral history, archival narrative, newspaper accounts, and fascinating illustrations to paint a remarkable picture of Minnesota’s queer history. More than 120 concise historical essays lead readers from the earliest evidences of queer life in the state before the Second World War—for example, Oscar Wilde’s visit to Minnesota and “rumors” at the Alexander Ramsey house—to riverfront vice districts, protest and parade sites, bars, 1970s collectives, institutions, public spaces, and private homes.Less

Land of 10,000 Loves : A History of Queer Minnesota

Stewart Van Cleve

Published in print: 2012-09-01

For too long, LGBTQ communities—including Minnesota’s—have been maligned, misrepresented, and often outright ignored. Myths regarding the queer experience have grown and become embedded in local and national consciousness. The absence of queer stories over time in local historical and popular writing only served to further this ignorance, but great strides have been made in recent decades to celebrate Minnesota’s vibrant queer history. This book presents a history of queer life in Minnesota. The text blends oral history, archival narrative, newspaper accounts, and fascinating illustrations to paint a remarkable picture of Minnesota’s queer history. More than 120 concise historical essays lead readers from the earliest evidences of queer life in the state before the Second World War—for example, Oscar Wilde’s visit to Minnesota and “rumors” at the Alexander Ramsey house—to riverfront vice districts, protest and parade sites, bars, 1970s collectives, institutions, public spaces, and private homes.

This anthology pays tribute to Allan Berube, a self-taught historian and MacArthur Fellow who was a pioneer in the study of lesbian and gay history in the United States. Best known for his Lambda ...
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This anthology pays tribute to Allan Berube, a self-taught historian and MacArthur Fellow who was a pioneer in the study of lesbian and gay history in the United States. Best known for his Lambda Literary Award-winning book Coming Out Under Fire: The History of Gay Men and Women in World War II, Berube also wrote extensively on the history of sexual politics in San Francisco and on the relationship between sexuality, class, and race. The editors of this book, who were close colleagues and friends of Berube, have selected sixteen of his most important essays, including hard-to-access articles and unpublished writing. The book provides a retrospective on Berube's life and work while documenting the emergence of a grassroots lesbian and gay community history movement in the 1970s and 1980s. Taken together, the essays attest to the power of history to mobilize individuals and communities to create social change.Less

My Desire for History : Essays in Gay, Community, and Labor History

Allan Berube

Published in print: 2011-06-01

This anthology pays tribute to Allan Berube, a self-taught historian and MacArthur Fellow who was a pioneer in the study of lesbian and gay history in the United States. Best known for his Lambda Literary Award-winning book Coming Out Under Fire: The History of Gay Men and Women in World War II, Berube also wrote extensively on the history of sexual politics in San Francisco and on the relationship between sexuality, class, and race. The editors of this book, who were close colleagues and friends of Berube, have selected sixteen of his most important essays, including hard-to-access articles and unpublished writing. The book provides a retrospective on Berube's life and work while documenting the emergence of a grassroots lesbian and gay community history movement in the 1970s and 1980s. Taken together, the essays attest to the power of history to mobilize individuals and communities to create social change.